


It's Affection, Always

by larrythebrave



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: 23 year old Louis, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Non-Famous, Bottom Harry, Eventual Smut, Fluff, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious, PT Harry, Sexual Tension, Top Louis, Unfit Louis, personal trainer, personal training
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:01:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23091499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larrythebrave/pseuds/larrythebrave
Summary: It’s not that Louis is overweight or anything, he actually looks like he’s in shape somehow, but he knows that he is extremely unfit and eats nothing but fast food. He is uncomfortably aware of how hard he breathes after walking up a few flights of stairs at uni, although he tries his hardest to suppress the coughing fits, more often than not, he can’t help but need a few minutes to catch his breath when he reaches the top. Maybe he can blame the coughing fits on the fact that he smokes nearly a pack a day, but he also does absolutely no exercise, unless walking to the corner shop down the road every day to get more cigarettes counts.He wasn’t always this way – a couch potato, that is. He played footy throughout the entirety of his school years, and he has been meaning to sign up for his university social footy club, but life has been a little crazy. It’s only been 2 years since he started going to uni. Get off his back, alright.~or, the one where Louis really needs to get back in shape, and his BFF Niall just happens to be friends with Harry, a PT. Louis might just have a itty bitty crush on Harry from when he met him a few months earlier, for all of 30 seconds.
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 1
Kudos: 21





	It's Affection, Always

**Author's Note:**

> This hasn't been beta'd yet, so apologies for any spelling or grammar mistakes.  
> Please feel free to leave opinions and feedback, what you liked, didn't like, what you want to see happen, etc.  
> I'll add more tags as they come up.  
> Most importantly, Enjoy !

It’s not that Louis is overweight or anything, he actually looks like he’s in shape somehow, but he knows that he is extremely unfit and eats nothing but fast food. He is uncomfortably aware of how hard he breathes after walking up a few flights of stairs at uni, although he tries his hardest to suppress the coughing fits, more often than not, he can’t help but need a few minutes to catch his breath when he reaches the top. Maybe he can blame the coughing fits on the fact that he smokes nearly a pack a day, but he also does absolutely no exercise, unless walking to the corner shop down the road every day to get more cigarettes counts.

He wasn’t always this way – a couch potato, that is. He played footy throughout the entirety of his school years, and he has been meaning to sign up for his university social footy club, but life has been a little crazy. It’s _only_ been 2 years since he started going to uni. Get off his back, alright.

Louis decides he really should actively do something about his level of fitness, or lack thereof, when he’s walking up the stairs to get to his first sociology class after the holiday break and he ends in a coughing fit that is so intense that his vision goes black and he finds himself gripping onto the wall to stop him from falling over. Niall, who has been Louis’ best friend since they were just little youngsters, about 10 years old or something, always gives Louis a brief concerned look each time Louis is gasping for breath. This time though, Niall is patting Louis on the back and asking with a concerned yet casual voice; “yer alright, mate?” 

Louis manages to nod his head before barking out another string of coughs. After a couple of minutes and downing an entire bottle of water, Louis is able to stand upright without the help of the steady wall, and he’s finally able to breathe normally again.

“I’m good,” Louis nods, taking another drink of water, now from Niall’s bottle of water because he had discarded his own empty bottle.

“Lou,” Niall starts, and Louis is already cringing because he can see that Niall is looking at him with _that_ look on his face; concern.

“I’m fine, Ni. Don’t worry about me. I just need to get back in shape, go on some nightly runs or something. Maybe I’ll finally join the footy team they have here.”

“Maybe you should get a personal trainer. They’ll be able to keep you on track and make sure you don’t slack off.”

Louis feigns offense by opening his mouth, furrowing his brow and putting a hand against his chest as if he was deeply offended by what Niall had suggested. The act alone has Niall laughing and reaching an arm out to smack Louis across the back of the head, but Louis manages to duck out of the way just in time.

“Firstly,” Louis puts one finger up in front of him, “I am _deeply_ offended that you have no faith in me to keep myself motivated. _Deeply_ offended, Niall.” Niall is laughing and shaking his head softly at Louis, but he has a fond look on his face because this is how Louis is; silly and ridiculous and so very dramatic, all the damn time.

“and secondly,” Louis puts another finger up, as if he was giving the peace sign for a photo, “ _where_ am I meant to get the money for a personal trainer? Should I just pull it out of my ass?”

“I wouldn’t put it past you, honestly. You do seem to like having -“ at that Louis is clasping a hand over Niall’s mouth, stopping him from continuing his sentence because he _knows_ where Niall is going with that and there is a group of fellow students standing _right next to them._

Louis isn’t in the closet, in fact he’s out and proud, but that doesn’t mean he wants all his classmates to know what he does and doesn’t like in his bum, okay. He would like some information to stay quiet. Plus, if people hear about how much he likes stuff in his bum, they might think he’s a bottom; which he’s not, by the way. He’s a top, most of the time, and he doesn’t need people to think he’s a bottom because then potential future sexual partners might not be interested if they are strictly a bottom. You see?

Louis is brought out of his thoughts when Niall licks a fat strip up the entire length of Louis’ palm, to which, Louis’ face crumples in disgust and he’s wiping his hand off on his jeans because _gross._

“I tried to warn you, man. You were off in fairy land or something.” Niall is laughing. When is he not laughing though?

Before Niall can say anything further, Louis is turning on his heel and walking in the other direction, away from Niall, but also away from their sociology class which is starting in 2 minutes.

“Where are you going?” Niall yells out, still laughing, that fucker. Louis simply sticks his arm in the air, giving Niall the bird from over his shoulder. He might hear Niall’s laugh get louder, and it might make his own smile grow, but no one needs to know that.

. . . . .

Louis finds himself at the university’s coffee shop, ordering himself a vanilla latte, because even though he’s usually not a coffee drinker, it’s fucking _early_. 8.34am to be exact. Why do classes even get scheduled for this early in the morning? It should be against the rules, Louis thinks.

Louis doesn’t usually like to skip class, because he takes pride in his grades, and attendance unfortunately counts towards his total grade at the end of the semester. But, it’s the first class of the semester and he’s sure all they’ll be doing is going over the syllabus, which he’s already read over and highlighted the important parts and entered the important dates in his calendar. He found out after his first semester at university that he needs to be organised or he will definitely fall behind and completely forget about an assignment.

Yes, he did completely forget about an essay and didn’t realise until nearly a full 2 days after the due date. It’s safe to say that he didn’t sleep for about 36 hours and drank way too much coffee over those hours in order to get the essay done and submitted before he lost too much credit. That is why he needs to be organised, because he does _not_ want that to happen again. He had heart palpitations for a month after that because of the amount of coffee he had drank.

So now he finds himself sitting at a booth in the coffee shop, his laptop out, along with his textbook because even though he’s not in class, he could still use this time to do some studying. After approximately 3 whole minutes of attempting to read through the first page of his textbook, he takes his phone out and he’s scrolling through Instagram instead. It’s still way too early for his brain to be functioning properly anyway.

A notification pops down from the top of the screen, showing a text from Niall, whose contact name is actually just the irish flag emoji, because, well, Niall is Irish. Pretty self-explanatory actually.

Niall: **_Ur lucky I covered for your ass and said you suddenly felt really sick and that’s why ur not in class_ **

Louis rolls his eyes, then he realises he’s in a public place alone, and looks around to see if anyone saw him and is now looking at him strangely. Luckily, he notices that there is only one other person in here – apart from the barista of course – a mature age student who seems deeply engrossed in her textbook. Louis looks back down at his phone and types out his response, keeping it simple.

Louis: **_why_ **

Before he can even switch back to the Instagram app, a response from Niall has already popped up on his screen.

Niall: **_bc we have the dragon as our teacher_ **

No further explanation is needed on Niall’s behalf. Louis and Niall had Ms Coiner for a sociology class in their first semester at uni and they learnt very quickly that she hated people not attending class. Louis tips his head back, groaning at the thought of having to deal with that particular teacher again. This missed class is definitely going to go towards his grade. Nothing that can be done about it now, Louis tries to tell himself, but if Niall said he was sick, he has to go home before he potentially crosses paths with Ms Coiner as she’s walking between classes.

Louis packs up his laptop and textbooks, shoving them in his bag and grabbing his coffee, thankfully in a to-go cup, and is out the door with a wave to the girls behind the counter.

. . . . .

Louis decides to walk home. He clearly needs the exercise and it’s only a 30-minute walk to his flat that he shares with Niall, and it’s actually a decent day weather wise, considering its still winter. He thumbs out a quick text to the Irish boy to let him know he’s heading home to avoid the potential raff of the dragon if she was to catch sight of Louis when he was meant to be sick. He gets a text back from Niall almost immediately

Niall: **_gd idea mate see u later_ **

Louis shakes his head to himself at the state of Niall’s spelling and grammar. No matter how many times Louis has tried to tell Niall that it’s not 2010 anymore and no one messages like that anymore unless they’re over the age of 30, which he is _not._ They are both just a mere 23 years of age. They’re a few years older than most of their classmates but that’s because they decided to go backpacking for 2 years after school finished, and then when they came back, they needed money to be able to go to university. So, they worked full time shitty jobs for another year; bringing them to the tender age of 21 before they started university.

Now they both work at the local, _ahem_ , women’s club.

Okay, it’s a strip club, alright? Louis is just a bartender, but he does have to be shirtless and wear tiny little booty shorts. Niall dabbles in stripping when they’re in need of someone to fill in, but he’s a bartender most of the time. It pays the bills, is the main thing. The people love Louis, even if he’s not the most muscly, manly man who works there. They seem to like his wit and charm, leaving him very generous tips with their numbers written on a napkin. Which is very kind, and there have been a few that Louis would consider texting, except for the fact that, you know, Louis is gay and all. 

Louis is barely 10 minutes into his journey home and he is sweating. He can feel the beats of sweat building at the base of his back, some getting heavy enough to then be pulled down by gravity and soak into the material of his pants. He’s breaking heavy; his chest rising and falling rapidly. He’s halfway up a hill, which feels like a damn _mountain,_ and he decides, fuck it, and sits down on the bus stop bench just a few more metres ahead. 

He hasn’t been this out of shape, well, ever. His legs are tired just from walking up this damn hill, and he’s not even halfway home. Would it be pathetic of him to just wait for the next bus? No one else would ever need to know; not even Niall. 

He pulls his phone out and it unlocks to his messages with Niall. He groans and bites the inside of his lip slightly before thumbing out a message to his friend 

Louis: **_so a personal trainer?_ **

He doesn't feel the need to elaborate, knowing Niall will understand. He then taps the home button and quickly navigates to the bus timetables. Louis makes a deal with himself; if he has to wait more than 10 minutes for the next bus, he’ll just continue walking home. If one is coming soon, then he will wait and just catch the bus home. 

As fate has it, the timetable shows that a bus should be there in the next 4 minutes. Wait, he shall. 

His phone vibrates with a notification; a new message from Niall.

Niall: **_me mate harry is a pt at the gym i go to_ **

Of course Niall is friends with a personal trainer. He’s friends with everyone. Trying to find someone who does a particular job? Don’t bother googling, just ask Niall if he knows someone in the profession. Louis responds,

Louis: **_you have friends who arent me?_ **

Louis can hear the bus approaching, so he places his phone back in his pocket and gets up to hail the bus. He ignores the vibration in his pocket, not bothering to check his notifications until he gets home. Instead, he spends the bus ride looking out the window and wondering if he should give up smoking, but that thought only lasts as long as the bus ride itself - a whole 7 minutes - because as soon as he steps off the bus, he wants a cigarette. 

. . . . .

Louis’ relaxing on his couch later that morning, with his feet propped up on the coffee table in front of him, one hand loosely holding the remote next to him and the other stretched back behind him and resting on his neck, elbow in the air. He’s not even really focusing on the television; which is playing reruns of the bachelor. Well, if Niall walks in, he’ll say he’s not paying attention. There is no reason that Niall needs to know that he enjoys watching trashy reality tv. 

He hasn’t looked at his phone since before he got on the bus, having discarded it on the kitchen bench when he got home and going straight for the couch. It’s been a few hours and he’s expecting Niall to come through the door any minute now. 

His mind wanders to the idea of trying to get in shape, and he thinks it’s probably time to join the uni footy team. Although, he should probably go for a few runs - or walks, to begin with - so that he doesn’t look like an 80 year old bending over in a coughing fit after 5 minutes of drills. 

He’s a little disappointed in himself, to be honest. He was in great shape when he was 17, going for morning runs before school every day, for at least 30 minutes. That was non-stop running. Now he’d be lucky to be able to run 5 minutes without taking a breath. When he was 18, he and Niall went backpacking and would be walking for an entire 12 hour day, and they even climbed a few mountains and went camping. But when they came back to England, they both ended up getting shitty full time office jobs where they sat down for 10 hours a day. Since then, his fitness and physical health has declined drastically. It also doesn’t help that he eats take out at _least_ once a day. 

He realises that he never checked to see if Niall responded to him about his friend being a personal trainer. Louis joked about how he couldn’t afford it, but Niall and him both know they make decent money at their jobs, and Louis still has some savings that his _very rich_ grandfather left him in his will. He may have only been a few years old when his grandfather died, but he is extremely grateful for the _very large_ amount of money left for him to access when he turned 18. How else do you think an 18 year old could afford to go on a two year backpacking trip? 

He sighs, puts his feet firmly on the ground, then lists his arms above his head and throws them forwards in an attempt to create momentum and help him off the couch. It kind of works, but he also stumbles slightly and has to grab the arm of the couch to steady himself. Once he’s regained his balance, he walks towards the kitchen to grab his phone. The screen lights up and he sees that he has multiple unread messages but all he can pay attention to is the 14 unread messages from Niall. Fourteen. He thinks he sees a message from his mum in his notifications as well, and maybe some from an unknown number, but they’re all swallowed by all of Niall’s messages. 

Louis unlocks his phone and navigates to his messages with Niall. 

**_yes louis, i do have friends who r not u_ **

**_anyway harry is great_ **

**_and he said ur cool_ **

**_remember when he came to our house and u told him off 4 sitting in ur spot on the couch_ **

**_and u made him move_ **

**_then u didnt even sit with us_ **

**_u went to ur room_ **

**_he said ur strange_ **

**_cant argue with that logic_ **

**_should i send him ur number_ **

**_y did u stop replying_ **

**_are u mad i have other friends_ **

**_lou im gonna send him ur number_ **

**_i sent him ur number_ ** ****__  
  


Well, fuck. I guess that’s what Louis gets for ignoring his phone for multiple hours. He goes to type out a response to Niall, telling him that _no,_ he isn’t ignoring him, and to thank him for giving his number to a complete stranger, because that’s not weird at all. He stops halfway through the message though because he hears the keys in the front door and knows Niall’s home. 

“Thank you for giving out my number to a complete stranger, Ni. Nothing like stranger danger or anything. If I get murdered, it’s on you.” Louis deadpans as soon as Niall shuts the front door behind him. 

“Hi Lou, you’re welcome.” is all Niall says, shrugging off his jacket and toeing off his shoes. 

“Also, I was not ignoring you. I just got distracted watching tv and didn’t look at my phone.” 

Niall turns to look at the tv and Louis sees him smirking. He follows his gaze and he immediately feels his face get hot, his cheeks most definitely turning a shade of red because the tv is still playing the Bachelor. 

“Obviously I wasn’t watching this. I was just flicking through the channels before you came in.” Louis attempts, feeling confident that he’s at least a little convincing, but then Niall shakes his head starts laughing, taking any and all of Louis’ confidence with him. 

“Save it mate, I know you like to watch those shows. It’s cool. We all have our guilty pleasures.” Niall shrugs and walks towards the kitchen, presumidly to get something to eat. 

“What's your guilty pleasure then?” Louis asks, trying to get this conversation away from the fact that he likes to watch trashy reality tv shows. He watches Niall take out various items from the fridge, not really paying attention to what they are. 

He does not expect niall to respond with “probably gay porn” in the most casual tone that Louis has ever heard. As if it was totally normal to admit to your gay best friend that you, a heterosexual, enjoy watching gay porn. Only Niall, ladies and gentleman. Louis is so shocked at the causality and nanchilance of Niall’s admission that he sucks a breath in harshly and chokes slightly, causing him to cough a few times. When he recovers, he looks up to see Niall smirking at him, once again. 

“And why do you watch gay porn when you’re straight?” Louis asks, hands on his hips, as if he’s a parent about to give a lecture to their child. Niall simply does a one shoulder shrug and shoves a bite of his food - a sandwich - in his mouth. 

“It’s interesting.” Niall says, mouth still full of food, mayonnaise starting to drip out of the corner of his mouth. Louis has never been so confused. 

“You don't watch porn because it’s interesting, Ni. You watch it to get off.”

“I know, Louis. I’m not an idiot.” 

Louis narrows his eyes, his head tilting to the side, and his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. He decides it’s not worth it and shakes his head, as if ridding the thoughts and questions from his mind. He turns suddenly and goes to walk to his room. 

“Did Harry message you?” he hears Niall call out behind him. Right. Niall gave him his number. 

“Dunno,” is all Louis calls back before he’s in his room and shutting his door, successfully cutting Niall’s questions off. 

He sits on the edge of his bed and reaches into the pocket of his jeans to pull out his phone. He doesn’t know why he feels nervous to check his messages. Maybe it’s because he remembers when Harry came around to their house, and he knows he was a dick to him. He told him to move because the boy had been sitting in _louis’ spot_ on the couch. He did move, which was surprising because anyone else he’d ever told to move had just flipped him off and gone back to whatever they were doing before. Harry apologised and got up immediately. Louis felt like a dick so he went to his room instead of joining them on the couch, like he had originally planned. He wanted to escape to the safety of his room, where he groaned to himself and cursed himself for being an asshole. 

He remembers how Harry looked, and _god_ did he look good. He remembers those skin tight jeans, his grey jumper with the little elbow pads, and Louis could never forget the boy’s hair. That fluffy, curly hair that looked like it sat perfectly from the moment the boy woke to the moment he went to sleep. Louis thought about him constantly for weeks after that day. He kept hoping that Niall would bring him over again, just so he could sit and stare at the boy. _God_ he’s such a creep. But if you had seen the boy, you’d understand where Louis was coming from. 

Louis places his phone down and wipes his palms against his jeans, ridding them of the excess sweat that’s just started to escape. He’s being silly, he thinks to himself. Harry probably hasn’t even messaged him and he’s nervous for no reason at all. He takes a breath and unlocks his phone quickly, going to his messages and scanning for any unknown numbers. He sees the messages from Niall, his mum has sent him a message that looks like a quick ‘good luck’ for his first day back at uni, his family group chat has some new messages that he’ll look at later, and then there it is. An unknown number has messaged him. Louis closes his eyes tight for a second, then opens the message, trying not to think about the boy who it came from. 

Harry: **_Hi Louis. Niall messaged me and gave me your number. I hope that’s okay. He said you’re thinking about doing some personal training? He told me you wanted me to contact you. Happy to chat about what it is you’re after and how I could help you reach your goals. Looking forward to hearing from you, mate._ **

Then as a separate message, 

Harry: **_Oh, it’s Harry by the way. Harry Styles._ **

Louis rolls his eyes but his smile shows fondness and he has to remind himself that Harry is just following up a potential business enquiry. He shouldn’t feel his stomach tighten when he reads the message again, and again, and maybe a few more times. 

He decides not to reply to Harry yet. He needs time to think of a response that wont make him seem stupid, or like he has a schoolboy crush. Because he definitely does _not._


End file.
